I collected my ’79 Malibu from the garage and headed toward Society Hill, a fancy neighborhood on the east side of the city near the Delaware River, where my client lived. Their home was off Two Street near Delancey, back in the mews. Private, secluded, away from the tourists and the prying eyes of neighbors. The last time I was here, the Irish girl answered the door. Tonight, Mrs. Hepburn opened the door and invited me in. She was about my age, with pale freckled skin, a face straight from the movie screen, about five-five, thin, with the most gorgeous mane of auburn hair I’d ever seen. Tonight, she did it in a French twist, held in place with a cameo comb. She was a runner; you could tell by looking at her calves. Heads turned when she entered any room, even women stared at her, wondering if they could keep their husbands away from her. 
 

     She wore a short cream-colored dress that flattered her breasts and legs. I guessed she was going out after our meeting. Before she stole the councilman away from his first wife, she had been a fashion designer in New York. What she ever saw in him, I’ll never know. What I know about women would fit on one side of an index card, with room to spare.
 

     “Hello, Mr. Maxwell, won’t you come in?” she said in that deep voice that sounded like too many late nights and empty whiskey glasses, scrubbed of most of the New York accent. She batted her green eyes at me. People who know me know I’m a sucker for a redhead, and it took all the self-control a Catholic school education drilled into me not to stare. She showed me into her parlor, and I realized the price you paid for privacy was a small house. The furniture was period pieces with cabinets and a grandfather clock that dated back to Franklin’s time. We sat in stuffed wingback chairs with a flower pattern. Persian rugs covered the original oak floors. Mrs. Hepburn snapped on two Tiffany lamps, adding a seductive glow to the room. She offered me a drink, but the fly should have all its faculties while dealing with the spider, so all I got was a glass of water.
 

     “You look very nice tonight, Mrs. Hepburn.”
 

     “Thank you.”
 

     “Are you going out?”
 

     She shook her head. “No.”
 

     I bit my tongue not to finish with, would you like to?
 

     Her smile disappeared . . . “is he doing it again? Did he find someone else, younger and prettier than me?”
 

     This was the part that made this a tough job. It’s the only job I know of that when you fulfill your customer’s expectations, you break their heart or crush their soul. I told her that her husband, as she suspected, was seeing at least two different women. He would see them at restaurants that were known to be discreet, or at the Latham Hotel on 17th Street.
 

     “Two women? At the same time?”
 

     “No, nothing like that.”
 

     “You’ve got documentation. Dates, places?”
 

     “Yes, in my report,” and I handed her the two-page report that she glanced at.
 

     “Do you know who these women are?”
 

     “Yes, in fact, here are some pictures.”
 

     She ripped open the envelope I gave her and stared at the pictures. The first showed a thirty-something brunette with long hair coming out of a restaurant with the councilman. The second was a short blonde who wore it in a curly perm. She was no more than twenty. They were standing on the sidewalk outside the Latham.
 

     “Really? These are the two women he’s been seeing? Restaurants and hotels? You’re sure about that?”
 

     “Yes.”
 

     “This is a joke, right? Did my husband put you up to this?”
 

     “Joke?”
 

     “Maxwell, either you’re the stupidest private eye in the world, or you’re in on the joke.”
 

     “Joke?”
 

     “Yes, a joke,” she said.

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